Stratford roadworks and parking: £1 park and ride, 1hr free

Traffic in Stratford is shaped by one fourteenth-century bridge and a town centre that closes for events most Sundays of the year. Neither of those is a roadwork, and both matter more to your journey than most roadworks do.

This page covers where to check what is shut today, the closures and resurfacing already fixed in the diary, what parking costs, and the western bypass the council is quietly reserving land for.

Where to check what is shut today

• County roads: Warwickshire County Council publishes a live map of works and closures at warwickshire.gov.uk/roadworksmap. Zoom in rather than searching. The same council page carries an email alert sign-up for works near an address you choose.
• The A46 and M40: these are National Highways roads, not county roads, so county listings do not cover them. Check National Highways travel updates.
• Event closures in town: Stratford-on-Avon District Council keeps a dated list of road closures for markets and events, and Stratford-upon-Avon Town Council posts individual closure notices as they are made.
• Forward resurfacing: the county’s Stratford-on-Avon future works programme lists carriageway and footway schemes with dates, often months ahead.

Closures already in the diary

These are dated and published, not forecasts.

Two more sections of the county programme, the B4455 Fosse Way at Chesterton and a second stretch of the A429 Warwick Road at Wellesbourne, are listed with their dates still to be announced.

The A429 through Wellesbourne is the one to watch. Four separate resurfacing schemes land on the same corridor between 19 October and 2 November 2026, and it is the main route between Stratford and the M40 at junction 15.

Sundays in the town centre

Waterside is closed from 9am to 6pm most Sundays between Bridge Street and Sheep Street for the Waterside Upmarket, which runs across the whole 2026 season. If you drive to the theatre or the riverside on a Sunday, the Bridgeway and Recreation Ground car parks are the ones to aim for rather than anything off Waterside.

Bidford-on-Avon’s High Street closes on the first Saturday of most months, 6.30am to 2pm, for the village market.

The routes that matter, and the bypass that does not exist yet

Stratford has no ring road. Through traffic between the A46 and the south of the district still funnels across Clopton Bridge, a fifteenth-century structure. That is not a quirk of history; it is a stated planning constraint.

The draft South Warwickshire Local Plan is blunt about why a bypass keeps coming up. Its Policy ID.4 justification states that “highway modelling has shown that there is insufficient capacity for further significant development south of Stratford-upon-Avon town and there are a number of capacity constraints on the highway network, including the historic Clopton Bridge.”

The policy protects land within an indicative corridor for a western bypass between the A3400 Shipston Road and the A46 at the Alcester Road end of town, crossing the B439 Evesham Road and joining Campden Road south of Clifford Chambers. It would also cross the Stratford Greenway at a height that keeps open the option of putting heavy rail back on it.

Two things to be clear about. The corridor is “an area of search only and does not fix the final alignment”, and the road is required to deliver the Long Marston Airfield new community and the 2,727-home allocation south-east of town, neither of which starts building before 2030. Nobody is driving on this in this decade.

The same plan safeguards land for five smaller strategic road schemes that would land sooner and closer to home: the A46 junction with the A422 Alcester Road at Wildmoor, the A46 junction with the A3400 Birmingham Road at Bishopton, roundabout and approach widening at Shipston Road and Seven Meadows Road, widening at M40 junction 15, and Marraway on the A46 at Warwick Road. It also marks an area of search for a second park and ride on the southern side of town near the Rosebird Centre, with 500 spaces.

What parking costs

Stratford-on-Avon District Council runs twelve car parks with more than 2,800 spaces in the town centre, all within a five-minute walk of the middle. Charges apply 24 hours a day, seven days a week, and almost all of them are card or app only, with no cash accepted.

The first hour is free at the Bridgeway multi-storey and nowhere else. It has 650 spaces, runs on number plate recognition with no ticket, and you pay on return at a machine. Under an hour, you simply drive out and the barrier lifts. The other main town-centre options are the Recreation Ground (378 spaces, Swans Nest Lane), Arden Street (240 spaces, eight electric vehicle bays) and the Windsor Street multi-storey (243 spaces, no lifts).

Since 11 May 2026 you can pay through the National Parking Platform, which means any of APCOA Connect, Caura, JustPark, PayByPhone or RingGo rather than one mandated app. Machines still work where they exist. Each provider sets its own fees, so check the signs.

The park and ride is the cheapest way in

Stratford Park and Ride is off Bishopton Lane by the A46 and A3400 Birmingham Road roundabout, postcode CV37 0RJ, with more than 700 spaces.

• Car park: £1 for the day if you arrive from 9.00am, or £3 before 8.59am. Overnight is £4 from 9.00am, £6 before.
• Bus: £2.50 adult single or return, £1.50 child, £4.00 group return for up to five people. Buses every 15 minutes for most of the day, 10 to 12 minutes into town.
• Hours: buses from 7.30am to 6.28pm Monday to Saturday, from 10.00am on Sundays.
• Drop-off is outside NatWest on Wood Street; pick-up is opposite, outside Cancer Research UK.
• Warwickshire concessionary bus pass holders travel free after 9am on weekdays and any time at weekends. Non-Warwickshire pass holders, after 9.30am.
• Height limit 2.1m. No motorhomes, caravans or camper vans at any time. Blue Badge holders park free but still pay bus fares.

Two people parking after 9am and taking the bus both ways costs £6 in total, against £9.30 for nine hours in a town car park. For a family of four using the group return, it is £5, which is less than a single adult ticket at most of the town’s paid attractions.

If you are heading for the railway station rather than the town centre, the park and ride car park ticket does not cover rail travel. Our page on trains from Stratford covers the services that actually run.

One current caveat: the Park and Stride walking route along the canal towpath from the park and ride into town is closed because of a landslip. The council directs walkers along Timothy’s Bridge Road instead.

Frequently asked questions

Where can I check Stratford roadworks?

Warwickshire County Council’s live map at warwickshire.gov.uk/roadworksmap covers county roads. The A46 and M40 are National Highways roads and appear on their travel updates instead. Event closures in the town centre are listed separately by the district council.

Is there any free parking in Stratford town centre?

Only the first hour at the Bridgeway multi-storey car park. Every other council car park charges from the first hour, and charges apply 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Blue Badge holders park free at the pay and display car parks, and at Bridgeway only through Stratford ShopMobility.

How much is Stratford park and ride?

£1 to park for the day if you arrive from 9.00am (£3 before), plus £2.50 per adult for the bus, single or return. A group return for up to five people is £4.00 and a child is £1.50.

Is Stratford getting a bypass?

Not soon. The draft South Warwickshire Local Plan safeguards a corridor for a western bypass between the A3400 Shipston Road and the A46 Alcester Road, but the plan calls it “an area of search only”, the scheme “remains at an early stage”, and it is tied to development that does not start until the 2030s.

Which roads are being resurfaced near Stratford?

The county’s published programme has the B4455 Fosse Way at Radford Semele on 24 August 2026, the B439 Evesham Road at Luddington on 28 September, the A429 at Wellesbourne across four dates from 19 October to 2 November, Salford Road at Bidford-on-Avon on 11 January 2027 and Southam Crescent at Lighthorne Heath on 15 February 2027.

Sources

• Warwickshire County Council roadworks map and Stratford-on-Avon future works programmes for live works and the dated resurfacing schedule.
• Stratford-on-Avon District Council list of road closures for the Waterside Upmarket and Bidford market closures.
• Stratford-upon-Avon Town Council news for the Ely Street closure, 10 to 12 August 2026 and the Stratford Food Festival closures, 18 to 20 September 2026.
• Stratford-on-Avon District Council car park pages: car parks in Stratford-upon-Avon, Bridgeway multi-storey, Arden Street, Recreation Ground and Windsor Street for tariffs, space counts and the National Parking Platform.
• Stratford Park and Ride, Stratford-on-Avon District Council for bus fares, timings, car park charges and the canal towpath closure.
• South Warwickshire Local Plan, Publication draft, July 2026, Policy ID.4 and paragraphs 3.2.4 to 3.2.5, for the safeguarded bypass corridor and the Clopton Bridge capacity constraint.

Roadworks change daily and event closures are added through the year. Check the live map before you travel, and confirm parking charges on the machine or the council’s own page. Checked August 2026.